We consider an auction in which the behavior of one potential bidder departs mildly from full rationality. We show that the presence of such an inexpert bidder can be enough to discourage all of an infinitely large population of fully rational potential bidders from entering an auction....

This paper presents an equilibrium explanation for the persistence of naive bidding. Specifically, we consider a common value auction in which a "naive" bidder (who ignores the Winner's Curse) competes against a fully rational bidder (who understands that her rival is not). We show that the...

We present results of several experiments that deal with endogenous entry in auctions and auction valuation. One observation that is constant across all of the experiments we report is that laboratory subjects have a difficult time evaluating potential gains from auctions. Even after they are...

Recent auction theory and experimental results document strategic demand reduction by bidders in uniform-price auctions. The present article extends this area of research to consider the effects of varying the number of bidders. Our theoretical model predicts that demand reduction should...

The auction of an object is considered, for the case in which one bidder is better-informed than the others concerning the actual value of the object. An equilibrium point solution of the competitive bidding game is determined; at this equilibrium, the expected revenue of the less-well-informed...

We present results of several experiments that deal with endogenous entry in auctions and auction valuation. One observation that is constant across all of the experiments we report is that laboratory subjects have a difficult time evaluating potential gains from auctions. Even after they are...

Multi-object auctions are traditionally analyzed as if they were a number of simultaneous independent single object auctions. Such an approximation may be very crude if bidders have budget restrictions, capacity constraints, or, in general, have non-linear utility functions. This paper presents...

The greedy heuristic may be used to obtain approximate solutions to integer programming problems. For some classes of problems, notably knapsack problems related to the coin changing problem, the greedy heuristic results in optimal solutions. However, the greedy heuristic does quite poorly at...

The distribution of the number of bidders in auctions with uncertain numbers is usually assumed to be Poisson. The observed distribution, for example in OCS Federal Offshore Oil Lease Sales, is apparently not Poisson. A simple model is presented showing that if the objects have different values...